The Underground Orchestra

Musicians playing on the sidewalks of Paris and in the Metro are ostensibly the subject of this glorious documentary by Heddy Honigmann who previously gave us METAL AND MELANCHOLY and O AMOR NATURAL. A ragtag bunch of international bohemians (an Argentine pianist, Romanian father and son violinists, a Venezuelan harpist, singers from Mali and Vietnam) are united by their experiences with political repression, and by a luminous spirit and boundless courage that led them to flee any number of horrendous situations throughout the world.

Finding refuge in Paris, music becomes their economic lifeline, but as this film makes movingly clear, it is also a shining metaphor for their will to survive.